For those regularly using carwashes, car maintenance is a real challenge that sometimes requires a lot of dexterity.
If the cleaning of a car body requires the use of a washcloth in order to obtain a perfect brilliance despite the solutions proposed by the car washes, access to this car body is simple unlike the rim whose access is complicated because of its architecture making thus the cleaning more difficult, particularly in its interior portion.
In order to facilitate the understanding of the presentation, we recall the definition of a rim and its anatomy. According to the dictionary, a rim is a mechanical portion of circular shape rotating about an axis.
It is closely related to several components:                The tire meant to be fixed to the outside of the rim, which has no interest in this subject,        The wobble which is the central element meant to be fixed inside the rim on the flange of the hub. The wobble is screwed by using wheel nuts.        
The wobble is the central portion of the rim. It is meant to guide the wheel around the axle that connects the two wheels. The drum and the brake disc are also integral to the hub. The offset is the distance in millimeters between the vertical medial plane of the rim and the plane bearing on the hub. The smaller the offset, the more the rim comes out.
The wobble is composed of spokes or branches. Indispensable in the architecture and design elements thereof, the spokes are obstacles to a proper cleaning of a rim in that they hinder easy access to its inner portion that we will call “the rounded portion” (r).
There are different kinds of spokes. Among the classic three, five or seven branches, we find the spokes like a bike and, between these two, there are all the intermediate cases. Due to their arrangement, the spokes hinder access to the “rounded portion”.
The brake disk (f) and the drum, which are generally a few centimeters from the rounded portion, also hinder access thereto.
Due to the arrangement of the spokes, the brake disc and the drum, several zones can be distinguished on the “rounded portion” (r): the zone upstream of the brake disc, which is of easy access, and zones of more complicated access that can be divided into three:
the zone a (a) located on the “rounded portion” (r) downstream of the brake disc and drum which hinder access thereto;
the zone b (b) located on the “rounded portion” (r) but hidden by the spoke of the rim;
the zone c (c) represented by the posterior face of the spoke of the rim.
There are various solutions for maintaining wheels, namely industrial products in aerosol or application, brushes for manual cleaning, wash cloths or wipes.
Industrial products for rims in aerosol or application are certainly the most used. However, it needs a jet of water to remove the product in order to shine the rim. This is why these products are usually applied on the day of washing the entire vehicle.
The problem is that the application of the only product does not allow obtaining a perfect cleanliness and a satisfactory brightness, hence the residual dirt especially in above-mentioned zones. This is why a manual cleaning is still necessary.
There are different types of brushes for manual cleaning, but all have one thing in common: they have the shape of a bottle brush provided with a handle and a cleaning head whose end is rounded or bulky. The problem is that this shape is not adapted to that of the rim which is rounded in a frontal plane and is convex in cross section.
Sometimes the end is so bulky that it cannot slip under the brake disc, thus hindering the cleaning of the portion of the rounded portion (r) beyond the disc (a).
Moreover, during its use which is manual, it is necessary to bring the maintenance product because the shape of the rim does not allow to keep the liquid, hence an almost permanent juggling act.
Some add it with the help of a container while others do it by hand. Either you have to drop the brush in order to bring the product with the same hand, or you have to add it with the other hand.
Among these brushes, there are some whose wash cloth covers all the body. The problem is that this wash cloth moves during use because it is poorly fixed, complicating thereby a cleaning which is already very difficult.
In addition, after cleaning rims, the brush or the used wash cloth is impregnated with greasy dirt which is difficult to remove, hence the interest to remove it to wash it properly.
As for those who do not have a brush, they do the cleaning by hand with a wash cloth or a sponge and we saw that access to the inner portion of the rim is difficult especially because of the integral disc brake.
The result of the cleaning can be satisfactory according to the dexterity and the tips of the ones and the others but often at the price of one or more injuries of variable depth to the hand. The injury is the main problem of rim cleaning.
Time and discomfort further complicate the washing process. Indeed the difficulty of access requires the cleaning of the spaces between two spokes one after the other and therefore the repetition of movements that become eventually tiring rather quickly. Since there are at least four wheels on most vehicles, rim cleaning can be very long.
Nevertheless, the rim is clean only on the day of the cleaning and in the following days because a greasy dust quickly deposits thereon. While it is true that for car bodies there are quick cleaning solutions, for the rim it is more tedious given the problems inherent in its architecture.
Fast cleaning is possible but difficult. In other words, how is it possible to quickly clean the rims without having to resort to a thorough washing of the vehicle.
Thus, the difficulties related to the state of the art can be summarized to the difficulties of access to the inner portion of the rim, injuries, time, discomfort, instability of the cloths during cleaning and fast cleaning.